BILLINGS— Intermountain Health made an agreement with Yellowstone County and the Worden Fire Department to station paramedics closer to rural communities.
Worden Fire Chief Lance Taylor signed the agreement Friday morning, which he said is a win for the community.
Watch the report:
“It's the answer basically to our prayers and what we need in Worden,” he said.
Two paramedics from Intermountain Health will stay at the Worden Fire station in Huntley, where they will help the four-person team of volunteer EMTs with the fire department.
“To find the volunteers to do this has been an uphill war for the last 20 years,” added Taylor.
He said having a sparse team means it can take more than 45 minutes to arrive at an emergency after a call.
“The volunteerism is at an all-time low and to keep losing calls and pushing them off onto AMR or services out of Billings is not good for our community. It's not safe. Sometimes the wait can be up to an hour, hour and a half before services show up,” said Taylor.
Sharon Van Dyke, one of the volunteer EMTs, agrees that the new arrangement is a victory for underserved areas.
“I welcome the help coming in because it does weigh on us, ones that we hear the pagers go off and we can't respond, whether it be we're at work or, you know, whatever the case may be. So, the more people we can bring into the community, I think it's going to be better. Safer, much safer,” said Van Dyke.
One of the paramedics who will be working out of the Huntley station, James Waller, is excited for the arrangement.
“Every second counts, every minute counts. So, to be out there and have a quick response is very important,” said Waller.
“It's taken a long time, a lot of research and a lot of thoughts gone into this. But moving forward, Intermountain Health really believes this is where we need to be to help this community,” added Tom Matthews, Intermountain Health clinical manager for flight and ambulance services.
Matthews said the new arrangement will allow emergency services to reach most of rural Yellowstone County within 15 minutes.
Intermountain Health plans to pay for the remodeling of the Worden Fire Department ambulances and the Huntley-based paramedic sleeping quarters.
Even though the project is not county subsidized, Yellowstone County Commissioner Mike Waters signed the agreement to confirm dispatch will direct calls to Intermountain Health in that area.
“Ambulance services are stressful in between Billings and a lot of Yellowstone County, out in the Worden area,” said Waters.
“We're just really happy this agreement has come together and that we now have ambulance service filling a gap that we were concerned about,” he added.
